


keep the car running

by aeroport_art



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Character Study, First Time, Incest, Jealousy, M/M, Poetic, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-10-24
Updated: 2007-10-24
Packaged: 2018-01-01 03:30:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,499
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1039834
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aeroport_art/pseuds/aeroport_art
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>If Dean gets to be a paper kite then Sam will want it too.</i>
</p><p>
  <i>Since Dad’s the tether and Dean’s the kite, Dean’s rolling rolling out. Far as he wants, and he won’t get lost because when the sun goes down, when the wind’s too harsh, Dad’ll reel him in and take him home.</i>
</p><p>A study of Sam's relationships with Dean and his father throughout the years.</p>
            </blockquote>





	keep the car running

Sam thinks: _This is how the day breaks_. A pull so tight it burns like water boiled onto his skin—blistering and scalding until he’s just melted, melting muscle and bone. He thinks the day cracked open with the sound of his skull but then he’s awake, he’s really AWAKE and he realizes, oh.

That isn’t how it starts. That isn’t how it starts at all.

\-----

_“Dean.”_

Silence. Then low breathing. Then a hand turning the clock on the nightstand around, a soft groan, and then a “ _What?_ ” that’s whispery (Dad in the next room) but vicious.

“Dean I can’t sleep,” all in a rush because Sam’s so tired his brains leaked all punctuation. He wants to scream bloody murder (because that’s what it was, in his head, until he woke up) but he knows it isn’t necessary, he knows Dean’ll get it anyway.

“Nightmare, huh?” Dean says, gentler.

Sam beams. Grimaces. He rolls onto his side and faces his brother, who’s really still asleep but he’ll humor Sam; he’ll match word for word like an automated message, listening to syllables and sounds and replying with correct, focus-group approved follow-up.

Doesn’t matter. It’s all Sam needs for now. “Yeah,” he says. “Yeah.”

Dean says “C’mere.” An arm is lifted, a two-foot space between Dean’s elbow and the mattress that’s canopied by motel comforter and he thinks of _tents_ back when he’d play _fortresses_ and it’s the same thing, really, only Dean’s his wall instead. Sam wiggles out from under sheets and ducks into his side.

Dean’s fallen back asleep already. Sam can tell because Dean’s quiet again but when he breathes out, he can feel it against his hair. It kind of makes his scalp tickle, and the base of his spine tingle, which is weird because how does that work? How does air on his hair make his spine stand up like that?

Sam wonders if Dean’s breaths can make other nerves light up. Sam fancies him a Zephyr like in those paintings, next to that naked lady on a shell, cheeks puffed out (like when he’s eating, the pig) and blowing air across the room, magic in his lungs.

Sam falls asleep thinking of Dean and wind, Sam’s skin singing and sparking until he’s just nerve endings, fried nerve endings and melted muscle and bone.

\-----

In the time it took Sam to think twice, he’d been smacked black and blue—a dash of yellow purpling, a pinch of cayenne pepper and salt and oh, that’s right, that’s exactly it, Sam’s a fucking casserole, now.

As if being beaten to a mulch wasn’t enough, he has to verbally take it twice from Dean as well. Twenty times from Dad, the hypocrite, too busy sweet-talking the glamoured monster to see her claws behind her back.

Sam wants to scream at Dad and stomp his feet but he's not twelve anymore; thirteen’s _different_ , thirteen’s _teenager_ , thirteen’s the age it took for Dean to pump a lamia full of blood-tipped silver and apparently, thirteen’s the age it takes for Sam to get his first ass-whupping on the field. Thirteen fucking sucks.

What sucks more is the pinch and drag of synthetic thread through his skin and flesh, Sam can’t watch but he does, does so with morbid fascination as he watches Dean put him back together with just his hands and synthetic thread. Sam’s open wounds look like slivered mouths of red and Dean holds it shut, shuts it up with a row of black stitches until his blood can’t speak anymore, only whines pitifully between its teeth in rivulets of gore.

Dad’s done showering. Dean’s dabbing Sam’s stitched up mouths with damp cloth, and when Dad walks out Dean proudly shows him, shows him how Sam’s guts are still inside of him, proper, like so. Dad grunts, Sam glares, Dean just leans in and says _Sam._

Like a warning. His breath feels red against Sam’s skin, like the stitched up mouths kissed across his chest and arms are splitting open to speak, and they’re conspiring against him. Dean’s neck is close beneath Sam’s nose and Sam can scent it there, there’s something there on Dean’s neck—a small yellow circle with purple bruising, and it smells like salt, it smells like spice.

“Jesus Dean, did you get hit too?” Sam asks and Dean stares at him. “Your neck,” Sam clarifies as he ducks his face down and pokes Dean’s bruise with the tip of his nose. Dean starts, jumps against Sam, and then he hunkers down and laughs.

He laughs and laughs and Dad looks at his sons and laughs a little and Sam’s not a part of this, he isn’t. Isn’t part of this like he wasn’t that evening, that hunt, that trip, that’s _Dean_ who’s laughing at him when he says, “That wasn’t the ghost, Sammy. That was Casey Robbins last week.” 

The bruise is yellow-purple right at the crook of Dean’s neck; it’s under Sam’s nose, in front of his mouth, and oh, that’s right. That’s exactly it.

Sam blushes, slouches, and the black-stitched mouths on him grimace.

\-----

If Dean gets to be a paper kite then Sam will want it too.

Since Dad’s the tether and Dean’s the kite, Dean’s rolling rolling out. Far as he wants, and he won’t get lost because when the sun goes down, when the wind’s too harsh, Dad’ll reel him in and take him home.

If Dean’s the paper kite, then Sam’s the trailing string of bows (can’t fly, can’t be trusted alone, follow kite—never free—) and tangled in the wind. Can’t even fucking keep his bows on straight, he has to wait for Dean to fly around and let him stretch out, let him loose. Dad’s not the one to help. Has enough trouble keeping Dean afloat.

Sam touches ground. The grass on the park is dry but the soil’s wet and he didn’t notice; didn’t notice until his butt turned damp and his jeans stained his shorts indigo blue.

“That’s what you get for being a lazy ass,” Dean smirks and Sam splutters because there’s grave dirt thrown in his face. _Gross_ , there’s wormy dead-dog grave dirt in Sam’s _mouth._

Yeah, grave dirt in the park. Some kid’s psycho dog, munching up children in its afterlife and Sam would almost find it funny if he hadn’t see the kid’s chewed up face, teeth in her eyes in her mottled brown hair; she was _crying_ in her _hair._

But then there’s fire, there’s liberal kerosene lit with sky flung flames and this is Dean’s favorite part, when death’s roasting against his face, and this is Sam’s favorite part:

Dean smiles crookedly, his eyes bright and alive though his body is limp with fatigue. There’s dirt dripping down his face and neck and he’s vulnerable; sleeves rolled up and his stance indestructible—he’s everything strong while he’s everything weak and that’s Dean, that’s just so _Dean_ , and that’s Sam’s favorite part.

Fire pit cessing to blackened ashes and rubs of white bone and this is the picture of a Job Well Done, and Sam gets to say that he helped with it too.

The wet seat of his pants say otherwise. But c’mon, it was just a stupid dog, two feet underground, Dean could’ve dug it up with a _spade._

Dad swings by after work (where he bags groceries? Pulls a wrench, drives a truck—deals in meth and women? Who knows; not Sam). From the street he calls _Dean_ and his son’s reeled in. Sam flutters after him, trailing in the wind. If Dad’s going to be the one to fly this paper kite, Sam has no choice but to spiral in too.

\-----

So this is Sam saying, this is Sam saying to Dean— _you know god, Dean, I'm not getting drunk. I'm not getting drunk tonight you know, you know, you know it won't solve anything I'm not getting drunk I’m still_ leaving tonight—

Dean buys him a shot, pours his own in Sam’s glass. They toast to nothing but the half-formed dreams in their heads (Sam to normalcy, Dean to anything but). Sam sips at his shot and Dean buys him another. Then another.

Another night in these carbon-cut places, (motel) two beds and a bath; (saloon) counter and some beers on draft. Dean with a girl. Sam in the back.

He nurses his drinks and thinks, doesn’t look, _won’t_ look—

Dean’s alive, he’s _alive_ with his skin abuzz while the booze backfires for Sam tonight—like always. He slouches. Dean’s working it, Sam’s nursing it, nurses the dregs of his beer tonight.

(In a corner, Dean has a girl on his lap. Some goth bimbo, black hair six piercings tattoo sleeves up to her pits, her hand on his dick. Dean’s smile grows an inch.)

Sam knocks back the last of his foul-ass beer. Won’t pretend it's not him getting laid tonight, no, not ever, not ever Sam getting laid tonight (Dean’s hand on her tit).

It's not Sam getting laid tonight, it's not Dean’s hand on his dick.

_Jesus._

So this is Sam leaving, this is Sam leaving Dean now— _you know god, Dean, I'm not staying. I'm not staying to watch you_ fuck _her tonight, not tonight. It won't solve anything, this isn’t just some_ phase—Sam smashes his lips on Dean’s mouth.

Dean spills his drink down his neck and elbows Goth Girl in the side as he scrambles back so Sam leaves, Sam’s leaving the bar (the motel, the city, _Dad_ and _Dean_ , Sam’s just _leaving_ )

\-----

Rice bits scattered over the floor look like maggots to Sam and he has half a mind to jump back and _scream_ (where there’s maggots there’s death where there’s death there’s somebody he loves; in his dreams there’s someone he loves pinned to the ceiling, raining flames, raining ash)—

It’s a wedding tradition so he hears, she tells him, and Sam laughs, he laughs to himself, laughs at himself. Cricks his neck and forces himself to stoop down and touch them, the little rice bits, they’re just _rice_.

Jess eyes him Sam wonders, in awe, he wonders: can he have this? This rice on the floor, there’s white gowns beside him, on racks. He touches the gowns, polyester crepe and silk acetate and snatches his hand back ‘cause they’re so clean, so white—no doubt something on his hands’ll rub off on the expensive gowns. He steps back to inspect for smears of old blood, streaks of black ash—

Jess laughs, used to Sam’s strangeness that comes and goes in random snatches; she places her hand on his and guides it over a veil—tulle. Plastic netting to go over hair for something so sacred and intangible and _unreal_ as a _wedding._

Dean would’ve shit his pants laughing, Jess putting the veil in Sam’s hair. Puffing out in white gauze like some Addam’s Family bride, Sam giggles and struts down the mirrored hallway, turning at the end and he catches a glimpse of himself on half-spin and for a moment, just a small heartbeat he thought he saw

_Dean_

Shakes his head because what the fuck, why would Dean ever be wearing a wedding veil? But then he remembers, like some memory waiting to be unwrapped—

_at fifteen, maybe sixteen, ‘cause Sam was just twelve. Waiting in the car, face smashed up against window and he sees, far away, Dean catches a bride. It’s like slow motion almost and Sam doesn’t get it, doesn’t trust his eyes as Dean catches a bride, white curtain over his hair as he spins on one foot, Woman in White descending down and when he gets shot, sprayed with salty shrapnel, that’s Dad at the barrel and Dean blacking out_

Sam feels sick. Locks himself in the men’s restroom as Jess knocks and asks _Baby?_ He plunks himself down on lid-covered toilet and falls forward, head between knees and he breathes, he breathes—

On the tile floor there are little black ants; little black marching dots that mindlessly rove in tight circles and circles and Sam’s got half a mind to just to jump back and _scream_.

\-----

Turns out, dreams do come true.

Sam lies. Jess dies. Dean packs up their shit and takes Sammy home—six thousand miles of route some-or-the-other and the asphalt and tape deck Dean’s anthem for “home”—

It isn’t home for Sam, the road. The risk, the _terror_. He’ll wake to the smell of thick smoke in his nose and he’ll sell his soul just to get a job done (how many killed? How many _murdered_ at the hands of a Winchester?). None of this feels like home for Sam.

This is home: on Tuesday Dean spikes his mocha with six shots of Kahlua. Sam just thought it was a really good mocha until he threw up on his shoes. Wednesday, Sam buys Dean his damned cherry pie—adds cherry tootsie pops (three licks to the center before Dean’s crunching candied shrapnel, mouth turning redder and redder as Sam’s breathing hard). They walk down the Castro in San Francisco and by the end of the street Dean’s got eighteen entreaties (for _sex_ ). When the tall one with the hazel eyes asks Dean for a blow, Dean blushes. Sam thinks this one might’ve backfired a little bit.

Wednesday night Dean gets him back anyway; Sam spits lotion and throws his toothbrush in the sink.

Thursday night Sam ties Dean to the bed. Unties him when the gyrations of Dean’s struggling hips prove too much.

Friday Dean kisses Sam. Sam can’t top that one, even if he tried. So he kisses Dean back.

Sam never believed that dreams sometimes come true but there’s this— _Dean pants against Sam’s neck and it sounds a little like_ Sam..god _Sammy_ —there’s this in Sam’s ear as something whispers inside, _they do_.

\-----

A harbor, dock. Two punts and a boat. His hands full of splinters and pant cuffs turned up. The water’s lapping at Dean’s dirty feet.

The damp wood creaks beneath Sam’s weight. The planks look fucking six centuries old and Sam’s arms are out, ready to catch something when they break him through. But they don’t.

Dean looks up. There’s salt in his eyelashes.

Sam sinks down, shoes and socks off and puts his legs next to his brother’s. The water, the waves lick at their ankles and draw blood away. A pull so soft it feels inevitable, the dark red of the hunt washing away in spidery strokes.

Dean burps. Sam smiles.

Miles of ocean beneath Sam’s feet and he feels it, feels the ancient world move beneath him till he’s a part of it all, ebbing out with every tide and it’s claiming him. He’s just liquid muscle and bones. Only Dean can pull him out and he does—wet kick in Sam’s side, saying “Let’s go.”

Sam gets up. They go. But this isn’t how it ends—this isn’t how it ends at all.


End file.
